Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1887-05-07

many sleeping maids, and where are they
nowf All dead-all dead, and an old baboon
in the rocks with startling suddenness barked
cut "all dead" in answer
And as she lay and heard, her youthful
blood, drawn by natures magnetic force, as
the moon draws the tide, rose in her veins
like the sap in the budding trees and stirred
her virginia. serenity. All the bodily natural
part Of her caught the tones of natures happy
voice that babe her break her bands, live and
love, and be woman. And 10! the spirit
within her answered to it and flung wide her
bosom's doors and of a sudden, as it were,
something quickened and lived in her heart
that was of her and yet had its own life-a
life apart; something that sprang from her
and another, and that would always be with
her now and could never die; and she rose
pale and trembling, as woman trembles at
the first stirring of the child that she shall
bear, and chung 10 the flowery bough of the
beautiful bush above and then sank down
again, feeling the spirit of her girlhood had
departed from her, and that another angel
had entered there: knew that she loved with
heart and soul and body, and was very
woman.
She had called to Love as the wretched call
to Death, and Love had come in his strength
and possessed her utterly; and now for a lit
tie while she was afraid to pass into the
shadow of his wings, as the wretched who
call TO Death fear him when they feel icy
| fingers But the fear passed, and the great
JOY and the new consciousness Of power of
identity that the inspiration OF true passion
gives to some strong, deep natures remained,
and after while she prepared to make her
way home across the mountain top, feeling
as though she were another woman. But
still she did not CO. but lay there with closed
| eyes and drank OF this new intoxicating wine.
| So absorbed was she that she did not notice
that the birds had ceased 60 call, and that the
eagle rad fled away for shelter. She was not
| aware OF the great and solemn hush that had
| taken the place of the merry voice of beast
| and bird, and preceded the breaking of the
| gathered storm
At last as she rose to go she opened her dark
eyes, which had been for the most part shut
while this great change was passing over her,
| and with natural impulse turned to look
once more on the place where her happiness
had found her, and then sank down again
with little exclamation Where was the
the hfe that moved and grew around herl
Gone and in its place darkness and the ris-
| ing mist and deep and ominous shadows As
| she lay and thought, the sun had sunk behind
the hill and left the great gulf nearly dark,
and, as is common in South Africa, the
heavy storm cloud had crept across the blue
sky and sealed up the light from above. A
drear wind came moaning up the gorge from
| the plains beyond; the heavy rain drops be
| gan to fall one Ivy one; the lightning tiickered
| fitfully in the belly of the advancing cloud.
| The storm that John had feared was upon
her
Then came a dreadful hush jess had re-
covered herself by now, and, knowing what
| to expect, stiatrhed up her sketching block
and hurried into the shelter of a little cave
| followed hT water in the side Of the cliff
| And then with rush Of ice cold air the tenn
pest burst Down came the rain in sheet
and then fash upon flash cleaning fiercely
through the vapor laden air, and roar upon
roar echoins i'll the rocky cavities in volumes
of fearful sound Then another pause and
| space OF utter silence, followed by blaze OF
light that da2ed and blinded her, and sud
denly Que of the piled up columns to her left
swayed to and fro like poplar i'll breeze
and fell headlong with a crash that almost
matered the cracking of the thunder over
head and the shrieking of the balloons scared
from their crannies in the cliff Through il
| jess, scared and wet to the skin, managed t.
climb up the natural steps, now made almost
impossible by the prevailing gloom and the
rush of the water from the table top of tht
mountain, and SO on across the sodden plain
down the rocky path on the farther side, past
the little walled in cemetery, with its foul
red gums planted at its corners, in which &
stranger who had died at Mooifontein lay
| buried, and So Just as the darkness of tn,
wet night came down like a cloud, home a
last At the back door stood her old uncl,
with lantern.
as that you, Jess" he called out in hi
stentorian tones. Lord! what a sightI' a
she emerged, her sodden dress clinging to he
slight form, her hands bleeding with Chamber
ing over be rocks, her curling hair, which
had broken loose, hanging down her back ant
half covering her face.
"Lord, what sight" be calculated again
} "Whv, Jess, where have you been, Capt
Mel has gone out to look for you with TIN
Kaifirs."
} 81 have been sketching in Leuw kloof, an,
got eau hit in the storm There, uncle, lie
me pass, want to get these wet things of
1t is bitter night" and off she ran to he
room, leaving long trail of water behint
her as she passed The old man entered tn
house, shut the door and blew out the Ian
tern.
snow, what is it she reminds me Off h
! said aloud, as he CROPPED his way down tn
passage to the sitting room. "Ah. ! know
that night when she first came here out OF tn
rain leading Bessie by the hand What ca
the girl have been thinking of, not TO s,'e tn
thunder coming up. She ought to kuo~ tn
sign, of the weather here by now. Dreaming
| suppoSc dreaming She's an odd woman
jess very Perhaps he did not quite know
how accurate his guess was and how tru
the CONCLUSION he drew from it. Certainl
She had been dreaming, and she was an cd
woman.
Meanwhile jess was rapidly changing hC
clothes and removing the traces of her strus
gle with the elements But of that otht
; struge's that sh, hai gvne through she OIL
not remove the traces They and the low
that arose from it would endure as long q
She endured. Ii was her former self that Ia
been cast Off in it and that now lay benin
her, an empty and meaningless thing like til
shapeless pile of garments. 1t was all yer
strange. So he had gone TO look for her, an
had not found her She was glad that h
had gone. 1t made her happy to think
him searching aud calling iii the wet and IL
night. She was only a woman, and it Wa
natural that she should feel thus. BY and
he would come back and find her clothed an
in her right mind and ready to greet hin
She was glad that be had not seen her, We
; dishevelled, and shapeless. A woman lool
so unpleasant like that. II might have turne
him against her. Men like women to loo
nice and clean and pretty. They gave her a
; idea. She turned to her glass and, boldin
the light above her head, studied her own fla,
attentively in it. Sine was a woman with
little vanity in her composition as it is possib
for woman TO have, and she had not till no
given her personal looks much consideration
They had not been of great Importance to III
in the Wakkerstroom district of the Tran
vaal But now all of a sudden they becan
| limit md ,cl.